Finally, if you enjoyed THIS erasure, you might also enjoy Not Normal (an erasure from the 2013 Mini brochure handed out at the Philadelphia Auto Show) and Biochemical Engineering (another erasure, this time from an amalgam of information about biochemical engineering from Wiki and Duke University).

Your golden hair and glacial eyes
Caught me, at twenty, by surprise.
(Or was I twenty-one or -two?
No Matter.) When I looked at you,
My heart bled fire into my veins.
Though little of me now remains
that, then, was yours--in what amounted
To only hours and days (I counted)--
Still it feels like years to me
My dear, beloved enemy.

My innocence wasn’t sacrificed,
So much as it was sliced and diced
Up on the altar of your dreams--
Fair tribute to your plans and schemes.
The god to which you bowed your head
Reigned over what you left unsaid.
No fatted calf, for you, would do,
But only paper, wood, and glue.
You could be but a friend to me,
My old beloved enemy.

You weren’t first, nor were you last--
The prize you won was for how fast.
Yet, sweetest, throughout all the years
(This is my secret and my fear)
Will ever be that glowing time,
When, in September, you were mine.
If lovers are as lovers do,
I’ll always be half in love with you--
The other half I’ll keep for me,
Dear old beloved enemy.

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Twenty-eight are silent in Newtown;
Five more this week in Federal Way.
But you can't look into my background.
Twenty-eight are silent in Newtown.
Don't ask me to put my name down--
My rights are protected by the NRA.
Twenty-eight are silent in Newtown;
Five more this week in Federal Way.

Sunday, April 21, 2013

the work the work
recently emerged, spans
the heart’s fundamental
activity, tools,
hardware, and
exploits

a variety of in vitro
and in vivo techniques
complex methods of deep stimulation
that disorder the restoration
of function and design
study singles' activity at
the population's level, to monitor
and treat diseases, activities,
and the organ

the system understands
efficient, dynamic, emotional
decisions and memories
a close relationship
between synthetic hearts
common as a new being,
already-established,
considered in itself

Coffee grown tepid in
the whale-tail handled mug beside me,
my unproductive fingers withdraw,
shamed and cold,
into the stretched-out sleeves
of a cashmere cardigan—
the precise color of a slice
of Wonder Bread,
kneaded back to doughiness
by grubby little hands
—a badge of honor
from a boy
I no longer consider.

Pushing away from the desk,
chair legs and floor cry out en masse,
protesting this untimely intimacy.
I rest my favorite aqua pen
on a chopstick holder (bird’s egg blue)
from the Asian store
on Connecticut Avenue where
many a lazy
lunch-hour stroll
led me,
way-back-when.

Choose a foreign (to you) language poem from Poetry International. Cut and paste the original-language version into a document and use the sound and shape of the words and lines to guide you, without worrying too much about whether your translation makes sense.

That's it, show's over.
Curtain closed, lights off,
He tells himself. You fool.
You stupid, lousy optimistic fool.
Disdainful smirk and pitying
Shake of the head, as
He climbs the long, sloping aisle,
Intricately tiled in various colors
Of dust and fog;

His heels, reverberating
In the cavernous space,
Tap-tap-tapping at his back,
Like a bad dream
You just can't shake,
Even hours after
You wake in a cold sweat,
Shrouded in your
Damp, clutching sheets.

The audience's collective gasp--
A few thin cries from
Would-be damsels furtively longing for distress--
Echoes, otherworldly, in his ears.
And he knows without knowing
That, years later,
He will still hear
The body
Hit the stage,
A rolling thunk, like a camel
Falling to its knees.

Later, at closing time,
In a dun-hued haze
Of smoke and Maker's,
He slaps the empty tumbler
Down in a puddle of sour
Bar-rag water,
Swipes at the stains with his fist,
And tries to forget:

The proud straightness
Of her back.
The silver bracelets slicing
The tender, sparrow-flesh
Of her wrists.
("I told you I wasn't worth the effort.")
And his parting glance--
Branded on his mind
With the clarity that tells a man
He'll never stop regretting,
Never be able to forget--
At her name,
Those letters, scattered across
Her dressing room door,
Like fairy dust
Sprinkled by
A vengeful Godmother.

Monday, April 08, 2013

Turn away from the amethyst afternoon sky.
Turn away, turn away, and don't raise your eyes!
My children, your father is gone now, for good,
And we're all alone in this strange neighborhood.
What happened, you ask? Well, you'll hear by and by...
He was eaten by African hippopotami.

Your daddy went swimming, unaware of his fate...
Like black clouds in the river, those beasts lay in wait.
One moment he was there, and then without a sound,
He was gone! A strong swimmer, he'd never have drowned...
So, they dredged through the muck, 'til one man, with a cry,
Held aloft daddy's hat, chewed by hippopotami.

Thank Auntie for the nice green-bean casserole,
And be careful, dear, that you don't drop her red bowl.
Seal it up with that precious, pricey tin foil,
And then fill the kettle--let me know when it boils.
Now, leave us to talk, dear, your Auntie and I,
About money, and daddy, and hippopotami.

No, Mrs. Jones, there won't be a casket.
The pieces they found wouldn't fill a small basket.
Why, yes, little Amy, there will be a grave,
Where we can go visit the parts they could save
From the sluggish brown water flowing tranquilly by
Where my beloved was eaten by hippopotami.

Thank you, Reverend, the service couldn't have been sweeter.
Now, here comes my poor mother; I'd like you to meet her.
The cakes and the punch will be served now, at home,
By some church ladies who think I shouldn't be alone.
But I'm not! My dear children are there by my side,
When I wake screaming, from nightmares of hippopotami.

Sunday, April 07, 2013

Around me, and for miles, trees,
Clutching, dark and prickly
Pressing in on every side, standing so
Close at every turn
I haven't seen a sunset
Burn the western sky for years.
Meanwhile, the rain, the clouds,
Pressing down upon my head,
A dreary crown, declaring me
A woman far from home;
A crown I wear haphazardly,
Askew, it still announces me:
This woman, here, so far from home,
This woman is standing,
still,
alone,
Fenced in by miles of black-green trees
And ten-thousand foot high
walls of stone.

Thursday, April 04, 2013

"The last warm day," she said,
"was in May or early June..."
No outrage, no high dudgeon.
Just a sigh, a downtrodden glance
at the darkening windows,
the slate sky's lowered brow mirrored in
the slate sky in the trembling water
so shamelessly flaunted
by the patio chairs'
depressed cushions.